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Renewable energy resources for beginners

Posted on July 18, 2009 by tuncali

You are maybe an economist, a financial analyst, or an engineer, or simply a layman interested in renewable energy. You think you need a solid overview but you don’t know where to start.

I don’t know what’s the best way to start, but I can tell you how I started and got deeper and deeper into the subject. My starting point was:

The Clean Tech Revolution: Discover the Top Trends, Technologies, and Companies to Watch

Clean-tech is of course a broader subject than renewable energy covering issues like biomaterials, green buildings, energy-efficient transportation and water. Nevertheless, it is always useful to have a broader view. Furthermore, issues like green buildings and water are closely related with renewable energy. You can use for example solar energy for water purification. Or solar thermal energy for water heating at home.

Clean-tech Revolution is really an easy and enjoyable read and very informative too. You find in this book also key information about markets and investments besides new technologies and trends. The list of promising companies in each industry might be very valuable for investment professionals.

Indian’s Suzlon Energy for example, one of the world’s fastest growing pioneers in wind turbines. This company is according to Clean-tech Revolution (2007) number 5 in global sales, acquiring new business in China, Europe and USA.

Solar is the energy of future. It is the renewable energy with the highest potential. Actually, our whole ecology and sustenance is based on solar energy; just think of plants, phytoplancton, coral reefs or other creatures which can photosynthesize.

Clean-tech Revolution notes that some large conglomerate companies like BP (British Petrol), GE, Sharp and Shell heavily invest in solar energy. Relatively new companies like Germany’s Q-Cells, Norway’s REC, California’s SunPower and China’s Suntech Power already count among giants in the industry.

Before I read Clean-tech Revolution I didn’t know that developing countries like India and China were so aware of the potential in renewable energy. And what’s my poor home country Turkey doing meanwhile? Stuck in a deep economical crisis with an unbelievable unemployment rate, Turkey is wasting time with political and ideological power fights among islamofascists, military and other secular forces of the country. I think, Turkey acutely needs creative politicians with new missions and enthusiasms like “green revolution for a sustainable future” to get out of this ideological blind alley.

Let’s come back to renewable energy from politics. Clean-Edge, the website of CleanTech Revolution’s authors is -though too trendy and businesslike- also a good source for uptodate market information for business professionals; but not necessarily for beginners.

OK, you read Clean-Tech Revolution, and now you have a nice overview. It’s now time to move on and learn more about renewable energies: Energy use in the world; global energy trends, and the place of renewable energies like solar, wind, bioenergy, hydroelectricity, geothermal, wave and tidal power etc. in the whole picture.

Renewable Energy, Godfred Boyle

Also an understandable and enjoyable read, Renewable Energy is the textbook advised by Oxford and Open University Worldwide. You can apply for a remote study at this open university to get an official certificate for e.g. energy sustainability. But the fees are especially for oversees students (out of UK) quite expensive.

After a short introduction about world energy supplies, which I find very useful, Renewable Energy dives headfirst into renewable energy issues like solar thermal (active and passive), solar photovoltaics, heat pumps, bioenergy, wind, wave and tidal power etc. The last chapter is devoted to economical issues and integration. Air-source and ground-source heat pumps are also handled in the content, although with less enthusiasm and coverage than they deserve for their huge potential. Not too many people know that over 70% of buildings in Sweden, and over 50% in Switzerland, are heated with geothermal heat pumps.

I like the broad view and interdisciplinary approach of Renewable Energy. You find information about both technology and economy.

Renewable Energy is, as its name implies, mainly about renewable energy. After I was finished with reading it, I thought, now I understand what solar or wind energy is. But what is the place of these renewable energy forms in the whole picture of the global energy consumption? What about oil, coal and nuclear power? You can’t say you understand renewable energy without understanding the whole energy issue.

Energy Systems and Sustainability

Another easy-read textbook advised by Oxford and Open University Worldwide. It tells much about the history of energy as well as the use and forms of energy.

Fossil fuels like coal (21.6%), oil (34.6%) and natural gas (21.4%) supply almost 80% of the world’s current energy cunsumption (year 2000 estimates).

In an industrialized country like UK most energy is consumed by the transport sector (34%). It is followed by households (29%) for heating, cooking and lighting, industry (23%) and services (14%).

As you might have already noticed, renewable energies like solar, wind and heat pumps have still an incredibly little share in the whole energy balance. But these figures are now changing rapidly. They are bound to change because oil reserves should last for about 40 years at current consumption rates (BP, 2003); natural gas about 60 and coal about 200 years.

You can download an renewable energy factsheet from the website of IEA (International Energy Agency, www.iea.org).

World Primary Energy Supply, IEA 2004

In less industrialized countries traditional biomass (bioenergy) such as wood, plant and animal waste etc. which is also renewable energy plays a greater role. Traditional biomass can be burned directly to produce heat, but it can also be converted into biofuels (modern bioenergy).

Annual Growth of Renewables, 1971-2004

The three books above will help you to understand the whole picture of energy. There are however still some issues that require a deeper understanding. For example, the energy policy as applied e.g. in North America and Europe; feed-in laws, green certificates and renewable portfolio standards. How will solar energy shape our future? How will the motor industry react to increasing environmental demands and diminishing oil reserves? What’s the future of electric cars? What are the latest green building standards?

Here is the list of books I can recommend for the issues above:

Useful links:

Tunç Ali Kütükçüoğlu, July 2009, Zürich

Please feel free to add your comments if you have other useful resources for renewable energy in mind.

Posted in Sustainable life | Tagged clean-tech, Renewable energy | 4 Comments

Difference between neoclassical and ecological economics

Posted on July 12, 2009 by tuncali

Assume you are living in a small village located at the shore of a beautiful lake. Your village’s main source of sustenance is fishery. You, like your fellow villagers, live a simple but happy life. You don’t have luxury cars, high-end music sets or swimming pools, but you have your close friends and relatives, and the beautiful lake for all sorts of recreation like walking, picnics, swimming etc.

One day, a businessman comes to your village with a fat local politician, talking about building a factory at the lake shore. The politician promises for more wealth and workplace. He says “we want to leave middle age behind us. We will have cars, modern TVs and music sets. We will eat fine food from the supermarket in the village center”.

Very seductive, isn’t it? Or is it?

Some critical minds raise questions about pollution and noise, but the politician assures that the factory will have a decent waste treatment facility and the level of pollution will be kept within tolerable limits. Tolerable means here, no harm will be done to human health.

This is also the way how a neoclassical economist thinks. The nature is a passive entity for either extracting natural resources like wood, minerals and oil, or a dumping ground for waste material. There’s no harm done as long as the carrying capacity of our environment is not exceeded.

Neoclassical model for economy & environment

There’s still an important question to be asked however, among others. “What will happen to the production capacity of our lake? How will this factory with its waste dumped into the lake affect it?” Remember, fishing is our primary source of sustenance, and for fishing we depend on our lake.

“Production capacity of a lake? How odd! Lakes don’t have a production capacity” says the politician. Yes sir, they do like most of other ecological resources like forests, oceans and rivers.

For ecological economics there are two kinds of capital: Natural and manmade. Consequently, there are two sources for our welfare: Services of natural capital (ecological services) and manmade capital. And that’s the main biggest difference between the conventional (neoclassical) and ecological economics. Conventional economists have a narrow minded focus on manmade capital and services. They usually ignore that an intact ecology provides us with the most essential products and services like clean air and water, mild climate, food, medical plants, erosion prevention, recreation, meaning and enjoyment in life.

“Why?” you may ask. “Are all of the conventional economists simply idiots?”

Well some of them might be. Some of them might have their own agendas, or serve the narrow interests of certain influential groups. Some of them might be well educated in their expertise area, otherwise perfectly ignorant in life sciences. Some of them may be too slow to adapt from empty to full world paradigm (see Ecological Economics, Herman E. Daly)

But most of them suffer from one-sided neoclassical ideology and indoctrination. As already mentioned, they focus solely on manmade products and services. Development and growth are measured by some dollar numbers which can only be representative for the amount and quality of manmade tools and services. Consequently, technology is for them an artifact of humanity; they are blind to the more elaborate and sustainable technology of nature.

Basic model of ecological economics

Now compare for example our lake as a natural fishery with a manmade fish farm. Feeding, breeding, diseases, filtering, aeration, cleaning etc. all these cumbersome issues that needs hard and boring work for an artificial fishery are solved automatically and self-sufficiently by the lake itself. An ecologically intact lake with its vicinity is a perfect example for a sustainable technology; it can produce fish for hundreds of years, whereas an artificial fish farm becomes a muddy, smelly and ugly piece of unproductive land after ten years of operation. New diseases produced in fish farms due to intensive fish keeping may even harm wild stocks. An ecologically intact lake is good for the welfare of the society; a manmade fishery is good for accumulating wealth in the hands of a privileged minority.

Assume you want to pull down an active factory in order to replace it with a new one. Every rational person, even a neoclassical economist expects a good explanation for this intention. You must show that you have no other choice than pulling down the old factory, and prove that the economic value of the new factory is much higher than pulling down the old one.

Similarly, the businessman in our case must convince the villagers that the opportunity costs of building a factory at the lake shore are lower than the added welfare value of the factory for each villager. Just think of the reduced annual fish production which is only one of the long list of opportunity costs beside noise, pollution and industrial ugliness. Aquatic crustaceans for example, decapods shrimps etc. as primary food source for fish react very sensitive to even lowest levels of pollution. What will exactly happen to the ecosystem of the lake? What will be the opportunity cost of reduced fish production? Rational economists should ask these questions.

Tunç Ali Kütükçüoğlu, July 2009, Zürich

Posted in Sustainable life | Tagged ecological economics, manmade capital, natural capital, neoclassical economics | 2 Comments

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009, Friedrichshafen (video)

Posted on July 11, 2009 by tuncali

Discus with youngs

You may watch below my impressions from the annual AquaFish Fair for aquarium hobbyists in Friedrichshafen, Germany (see Aqua-Fisch Messe Friedrichshafen).

My spontaneous narration in Turkish with subtitles in English.

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009 March, Part 1
Content in chronological order: Quick tour, assassin snails (Anentome helena), dwarf shrimps (Neocaridina sp.), dwarf crayfish (Cambarellus sp.), discus fish natural forms and selective-bred races, various suckermouth cathfish, frightened angelfish, Malawi cichlids, fish sale in larger aquariums, blue rams, selective-bred guppies, show aquariums

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009 March, Part 2
Content in chronological order: Congo tetras, colourful severum cichlids (Heros severus), Tanganyika aquarium, planted show aquariums, tiger barbs, snail cichlids, discus fish sale, selective-bred artificial discus races, selective-bred blue rams, bazaar of aquarium clubs, Tropheus cichlids, Malawi cichlids, pearl gouramies, peacock cichlids (Aulonocara sp.), large crayfish, sajika cichlids, dwarf crayfish, expensive suckermouth catfish

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009 March, Part 3
Content in chronological order: Tanganyika aquarium with lemon cichlids (Neolamprologus leleupi), Julidochromis transcriptus with snail cichlids, young & adult Tropheus cichlids, LED lamps, mini (nano) aquariums, blue rams with bright eyed swarm fish, lemon cichlids, Congo tetras with beautiful angelfish, roots for large aquariums, aquatic plant sale, beautiful natural form discus fish

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009 March, Part 4 (last)
Content in chronological order: Marine aquariums with bright colors, Schwabenaquaristik, Rio’s red tetra ( Hyphessobrycon flammeus), x-large discus fish pair guarding their youngs, artificial looking selective-bred discus in a back-to-nature aquarium, giant turrent snails, snail hunter assassin snails, blue moon crayfish (Cherax sp.)

Tunç Ali Kütükçüoğlu, July 2009, Zürich

Posted in Natural aquariums | Tagged aquarium, cichlids, discus fish, video | 3 Comments

Is evolution a kind of creation?

Posted on July 7, 2009 by tuncali

Evolution of whales. Source: www.edwardtbabinski.us/whales/

Evolution of whales; one of the best documented episodes of the history of evolution. Click on to see the whole picture

There are lots of hefty discussions about the Darwinian evolution and the biblical creation story in the forum on www.richarddawkins.net which I regularly visit. Scientific minds and biologists usually harbor no doubts about evolution whereas religious minds tend to hate this theory. Both parties however seem to accept that creation in the biblical sense must be instantaneous and from the scratch; a sudden explosion out of nothing.

I personally don’t think creation must be instantaneous and out of nothing; this is a wide-spread human prejudice. We don’t need such a miraculous creation; we only need a natural transformation process like evolution because anything, call it matter energy or whatever, that exists need not be created at all. I will try to explain here why I think this way.

When a man says “god created me” he doesn’t mean god created him instantaneously with hairs and beards. Religious or not, we all accept that this is a natural process; conception, pregnancy, birth, childhood, adulthood and so on.

Then why don’t some religious people accept that the human creation can be a natural process like evolution? We don’t take everything in Bible or Kuran literally, do we (I mean the famous 6-days story)?

I have a hypothesis as to why most people might think divine creation must be instantaneous.

Magic is a very old job. For example, there was a tradition of prophets in India. Every prophet was at the same time a magician. The prophets were not only trained in magic and illusion, but also in philosophy, rhetoric and poetry to impress people. These talented prophets traveled from village to village, demonstrated their crafts and told people that they were prophets. In turn, they received free catering, food and much respect. What do you expect more from a fruitful job?

How did a prophet prove that he is a prophet at all? Through magic of course. By instantaneously producing a pigeon for example, or by instantaneously curing a blind man (this is a well known trick). You see, magic is always instantaneous! The naive villagers believed that the prophet must really have some supernatural powers which always acted instantaneously. So, a miracle must be instantaneous.

Believe or not, there are still such traveling prophets in India.

Magicians and medicine men were not unique to India; they were to be found in almost every society of the world. All these men apparently had some supernatural powers and all their miracles were instantaneous. Why? Because a natural and understandable process is no magic for people.

If you boil a cup of cold water through heating, say in 10 minutes, nobody thinks you are a magician. It’s another story if you can boil it instantaneously without an apparent mechanism.

What is God? A supernatural power, so his creation or other miracles must be instantaneous! I say, this is a historical human prejudice, a leftover from ancient magicians and superstitions.

Up to this point, I tried to explain why creation need not be an instant magic. But there’s still another question however which awaits an answer. All these things that exist in our universe, stars, planets, galaxies, atoms… How did they came into life? What created them? How was the start?

There was a related comment in Richard Dawkins forum:

I guess the reason why it (creation) has to be in some way instantaneous is in the word creation: Creation implies that first there was nothing and at some point later something exists. I simply don’t see how something can gradually start to exist, it either does or it does not. So at one point it instantaneously exists. Certainly evolution could be interpreted as being the progressive work of a creator (assuming he exists as you do). But there is a moment were this creation starts to exist, the moment the universe begins if you want, and this will always have to be instantaneous. (The first molecule, or the first particle, or whatever, in short the first existing thing)

I personally don’t think total emptiness or nothingness should be the initial state of the universe. If we found an empty universe we could as well ask who emptied it. Why must something existing be actively created but an emptiness not? I think, non-emptiness and emptiness should have equal weights. That is, the universe need not be created from nothing because total emptiness was not necessarily the initial state.

Thanks to modern science and astronomy we know today that even stars have a life cycle; they came into life, shine for billions of years and die. The existence of starts are not explained by creation in the literal sense of the word creation as explained in the above comment. Their existence is explained by some natural transformation processes; from one form and shape into another.

Similarly, the word creation in the context of “life on earth” must not be taken in the literal sense. After all, all living things are made of organic molecules. We only need a natural transformation process like evolution.

Tunç Ali Kütükçüoğlu, July 2009, Zürich

Amazon.com Widgets

Evolution resources in internet:
see http://www.richarddawkins.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=19713 for an excellent listing. I personally recommend:

Posted in Science and philosophy | Tagged creation, evolution, philosophy | 2 Comments

My aquariums at home (July 2009)

Posted on July 5, 2009 by tuncali

I have at the moment four aquariums; one in the living room, three in the study. All of them are quite large aquariums with 200 liters or more water capacity.

1) Community aquarium in the living room (160x60x60 cm)

Community aquarium in our living room

This is a somewhat overcrowded community aquarium with variety of relatively peaceful cichlids like Colombian angelfish (Pterophyllum scalare), Bolivian Ram (Microgeophagus altispinosa), keyhole cichlids (Cleithracara maronii), and other species like endler guppies (Poecilia reticulata), bottom dwellers bristlenose (Ancistrus dolichopterus) and zebra catfish (Peckoltia sp. L134).

There are also several swarm fish like neon (Paracheirodon innesi) and red nose tetra (Hemigrammus bleheri) though their numbers are decimated from year to year, and I don’t bother to buy new specimens. The submergent (underwater) plants are Cryptocoryne and Anubias species.

I use emergent plants like satin pothos (Scindapsus pictus or Epipremnum pinnatum), creeping fig (Ficus pumila), umbrella plant (Cyperus alternifolius) and weeping wig (Ficus benjamina) as water purifiers and beautifiers. Thanks to these plants water remains surprisingly clean (nitrate below 25 mg/liter), and the fish seem to be quite healthy although the aquarium is definitely overcrowded. Nevertheless, starting from large flag cichlids some fish must be given away. Otherwise the 10-month old angelfish which will soon become territorial adults will have no space to live in peace.

You may find below snapshots from this community aquarium.

2) My biotope in the study; a low-tech natural aquarium (120x60x40 cm)

Biotope in my room; a low-tech natural aquarium

This is the aquarium I like most; a living example of maximum ecology minimum technology.

It has no heater, no filter, no air pump, no artificial lighting, no noise, nothing as to technological ugliness… Only plants, crustaceans like cherry dwarf shrimps (Neocaridina denticulata) and Hyalella azteca (a detritivorous and herbivorous decapod), snails, a couple of algeaters (Ansictrus sp.) and a group of lovely dwarf fish Dario dario with a maximum size of 2.5 cm.

This aquarium is an almost self-sufficient ecosystem similar to natural garden ponds. It receives sunlight from the window. I give no fish food at all except for occasionally dried leaves from the nearby wood, potato and carrot leaves for the herbivorous animals which make the foundation of the food chain. Watching such an natural aquarium is a totally different experience than the usual overstocked industrial aquariums with lots of technological man-made tools and equipments. Fish or shrimps don’t show up in front of you as if in a vitrine; most of time they hide among plants and woods. You have to wait and search them in the aquarium. Dario darios usually appear early in the morning or late in the afternoon.

I wrote two years ago, in 2007, a long article about this aquarium in Turkish with pictures and videos (see Odamdaki biyotop). I will soon publish a similar article here in English with new pictures and videos.

3) Low-maintenance guppy aquarium (120x50x50 cm)

Low maintenance guppy aquarium

I can’t call it a low-tech aquarium because it has an air pump driven sponge filter and artificial lighting. Nevertheless, it is a low-maintenance aquarium because I leave water purification to plants like satin pothos (Scindapsus pictus) and creeping fig (Ficus pumila) instead of using elaborate high maintenance filters or making frequent water exchanges. There’s no heater; temperature varies between 20-26 Celcius.

Yellow dwarf cichlids (Apistogramma borellii) live together with lots of guppies (Poecilia reticulata) and several bristlenose algeater catfish (Ancistrus dolichopterus). Dwarf shrimps (Neocaridina denticulata) and snails work as voluntary recycling agents.

The only sustainability problems in this aquarium are fast growing underwater plants like waternymphs (Najas conferta) or hornwort (Ceratophyllum demersum) which must be regularly pruned, and fast breeding guppies. The accumulation of organic deposits on the sand is a sure sign that the recycling is lacking behind and the aquarium is overloaded. Then the number of guppies and the amount of feeding must be reduced. Yellow dwarf cichlids are apparently too slow to decimate the number of young guppies.

Most of the young shrimps are eaten by dwarf cichlids, but some manage to survive to keep the population stable. Two solitary Echionodorus species, E. osiris and E. uruguayensis grow very well in this aquarium. The trumpet (Melanoides tuberculata) and ramshorn (Planorbarius corneus) snails are very important for the recycling of organic matter.

4) Low-maintenance dwarf cichlid aquarium (150x50x50 cm)

Low-stocked dwarf cichlid aquarium in the study

Two pairs of dwarf flag cichlids and a patriarchal cockatoo male (Apistogramma cacatuoides) with his two wives live in this aquarium. These two cichlid species get on surprisingly well. Since dwarf flags learned to respect the larger territory of the male cockatoo I witnessed no serious interspecial fights. Though seemingly dominant, the constant stress of keeping the robust dwarf flags under control might be too high a burden for the cockatoo male shortening his life; remains to be seen. On the other hand, I know that a cockatoo male needs a decent challenge to keep him busy and alert.

Ramshorn and trumpet snails, red claw shirmps (Macrobrachium assamense) and bristlenose algeaters (Ancistrus dolichopterus) share this aquarium with cichlids. A simple sponge filter driven by an air pump cares for aeration and water circulation. The temperature varies between 22 and 28 degrees celcius. Thanks to low fish population and water purifying plants water remains very clean (nitrate levels less than 12.5 mg/liter); perfectly adequate for sensitive dwarf cichlids.

5) Low-tech dwarf cichlid aquariums on my working table (60x40x40 cm each)
Panda dwarf cichlids (Apistogramma nijsseni) in the aquarium on the left handside with snails, guppies and a catfish (Ancistrus).

Tunç Ali Kütükçüoğlu, 20. June 2009, Zürich

Posted in Natural aquariums | Tagged aquarium, cichlids, low-maintenance, low-tech | 14 Comments

tuncalik.com – Natural Aquariums and Sustainable Life

Renewable energy resources for beginners

Difference between neoclassical and ecological economics

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009, Friedrichshafen (video)

Is evolution a kind of creation?

My aquariums at home (July 2009)

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Renewable energy resources for beginners

Difference between neoclassical and ecological economics

Aqua-Fish Fair 2009, Friedrichshafen (video)

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My aquariums at home (July 2009)

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